Riseholme: Lincoln’s Agricultural Hub

The future of Lincolnshire’s farming lies in their hands…

Featured image: Ducks wander on a frozen lake at the Riseholme campus. Claire Brownlow. Flickr. Link

Those who have lived in Lincoln for many years will probably recognise the name “Lincolnshire School of Agriculture” better than the eponymous name we see today.

However, Riseholme is more appropriate, since the school began life as Riseholme Farm Institute in 1949.

And Riseholme goes further back than even that. With signs of Roman settlements in the lands, this place has very significant historical value indeed, and is even recorded in the 1086 Domesday Book.

The 569 acres it encompassed in 1946 was sanctioned by the Ministry of Agriculture, which utilised it for the training of ex-servicemen and was run by the County War Agricultural Executive Committee. The Farm Institute was created when it was realised that places for farm students in the Lindsey area was getting difficult. In 1966 it became the Lindsey College of Agriculture.

The institute has expanded ever since, following a merger with De Montfort University in 1994 and an amalgamation with the University of Lincoln in 2001. In 2003 the University invested £2 million in the Rural Science Centre at Riseholme Park which has since served as a focus for agriculture and animal teaching and research.

The college is a “Centre of Vocational Excellence” teaching animal management, equine science, forestry and arboriculture, and horticulture.